Lagoon

We love Papa's passes to Lagoon (Don't ever retire. OK, fine, if you must. Sob.). Max and Benny have been a few times this summer with JB, and recently I went too and we took all four sons.

Max and Benny love the HydraLuge. It's a water slide outside of the water park. I love how brave they are getting on the rides and how excited they are, too.

Andrew melts my heart with his still-baby cheeks and his blue eyes and his crinkle-up smile on the carosel.

The boats. Oh the boats. He loves them. It was worth the long wait (that ride operator really took his time) for this boy to happily sit there in the boat.

James did pretty well I think. I had to sit and nurse a lot but I still was able to ride a few fun rides.

I like when Papa can hold James. He's so cute with babies, and I feel bad when mine is crying and won't cuddle up. Even though I know JB's parents don't mind the noise, I still feel bad.

You are getting sleepy....sleepy...

On the train.

After the train we wanted to get a family picture. But now Andrew was getting sleepy. See his face?

Now watch the hand go up to twirl his hair.

And once we got to the car, the hair twirling continued and he was out! Lagoon can really tucker out a little boy.

Smothered or really loved?

Poor fourth baby. Can't do tummy time without other faces right up in his grill. But my favorite part of this video is Andrew boinging the toy Minions on Max's back. Just adds to the cacophony that sweet baby James is learning to live through.

Hikers

JB and his brother Jeff took Max, Benny and Andrew hiking to Donut Falls last week. Andrew loved being treated like a bigger boy, telling me (yelling at me) "I go on hike, too!!!"

This was too funny to see in JB's camera. These three pictures are out of a long sequence where Andrew kept staring at the water and wouldn't look up.

Until Jeff dangled some Swedish Fish out.  Gimme! Says Andrew.

And now he smiles!

Max and Benny went all the way up to the top with Jeff's help.  Look how he's clinging to his uncle like a baby monkey. My 5 1/2 year old became my baby-Benny again in my eyes. It's so darn cute.

And then he couldn't help picking his nose.

And then eating it!

I'm also guessing Jeff is holding those Swedish Fish close, because Andrew is doing a good job looking at the camera again.

2 months old

At his two month checkup, James weighed 13 pounds 13 ounces! That's the 91st percentile. I love a chubby baby. At this same age, Max was 13'8, Benny 14'12, and Andrew 14'8. Big baby boys.

Sweet Baby James is getting sweeter. He has longer stretches of calm, and more times where he smiles. See below.

But, we are not out of the cranky woods yet. Looking through the pictures that JB took today, I saw a lot of this:

Now that's a mad face for sure!

A baptism and baby blessing

What an incredible weekend we have had in the Richards family. On Saturday our sweet oldest son Max was baptized. He had been looking forward to this day for many months.

When he came out of the water and walked back up the steps, he told JB he wanted to do it again. We are so proud of his eagerness to try and do what is right.

Afterward, we had a huge luncheon with JB's smoked pulled pork and other yummy food, with dozens of family, friends and neighbors in our backyard. No pictures exist -- JB was busy feeding everyone, and I was feeding baby James, then we both wanted to try and visit with everyone. Max also greeted everyone and thanked them for coming (without our prompting him to do so -- he's growing up so fast!).

The next morning, was sweet baby James's blessing. Here I am with him before church after getting us both dressed. Max took this picture.

Baby James is wearing the same outfit our other babies wore on their blessing day -- the same outfit JB wore when he was blessed. I put him in the swing for a second to continue getting ready, and he noticed himself in the mirror above himself.

Here are Max and Grandma before church, who drove out from Missouri for this special weekend. Benny took this picture! We don't see JB before church now because of all his meetings.

Here's the whole crowd of family after church. On the left are Deardeuffs and on the right are Richards. I don't think I was able to thank each person enough for coming to the baptism and blessing -- many drove long distances -- and it was great to be with them for such big events.

Suzanne dressed baby Phin in his blessing outfit again (he was blessed the week before) so we could show off the cousins together. I love this picture.

Nona hugged and walked baby James to sleep during sacrament meeting, and he stayed zonked out!

Our four sons.

I loved seeing Bishop Richards at the podium on Sunday announcing Max's baptism, then coming down for James's blessing. It has been quite the summer for our family, and this weekend continued the spiritual high.

Sweetness

I love these sweet cheeks.

And these....

Isn't it interesting how babies' faces change looks throughout the day? Like his confused/worried/pensive face below (with a very handsome JB in blue for those blue eyes)

And here's his sleeping face. So soft, so peaceful.

He's having longer stretches of non-fussiness, which is really nice. He'll smile at us and coo and say "gah," which of course means he's destined to be uber-smart.

Spudman

JB is a Spudman again! He did the triathlon yesterday in Burley, Idaho. One of the best parts is staying with his sister Sarah and her husband Joe. Last year I went with him. This year, sweet baby James would have made that difficult. So Max and Benny went up  -- and had such a great time.

They (Max especially) had tons of nachos Friday night, and checked out Sarah and Joe's new home. It's almost done!

The next morning Joe drove my boys around the race course to see JB come by, just like he did for me last year. They saw him come out of the Snake river, and saw him several times on his bike.

They also saw him during the run and cheered him on there, too. JB said it was such a morale booster.

And the finish line!

Isn't Sarah the cutest pregnant gal?

I'm just so so grateful to them for taking care of my boys. Max and Benny were so excited when they were telling me about seeing daddy all through the race. They loved the snacks, too. And I loved all the pictures Joe took of my handsome man on the course so I could experience it, too.

Then Max pounded down a double cheeseburger before they came back home.

Overall a very fun trip!